What Do The 2014 Camaro Z/28 And Aston Martin One 77 Have In Common?

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General Motors more or less owned the 2013 New York Auto Show by unveiling the updated 2014 Buick LaCrosse and Regal, all-new Cadillac CTS, and refreshed 2014 Chevrolet Camaro SS. But it absolutely put it away when the growl of a 500-horsepower LS7 engine fired up back stage, and the reborn Camaro Z/28 rolled onto display, surprising just about everyone (except for us).

The new Z/28 Camaro is impressive, by anybody’s standards: its powertrain is track proven, fortified by purposeful aerodynamics, gargantuan Brembo carbon ceramic brakes, and a unique suspension system. Speaking of which, the Z/28 Camaro’s suspension isn’t Magnetic Ride Control, like that in the mighty ZL1. Nor is it what’s found on the Camaro 1LE, or just about any street car from the factory for that matter.

According to those involved in the Z/28’s development, the unique suspension configuration features what’s called a dynamic suspension spool valve (DSSV) dampening system. The setup allows compression and rebound of the shocks to be dialed in at the factory for optimal performance. For the most part, such a system has been reserved for motor sports vehicles (“real” race cars), but considering the hard-core nature of the new Z/28, it might as well be one.

Compared to a conventional damper that offers only two-way tuning for compression and rebound, a spool-valve damper allows four-way adjustment to precisely tune both compression and rebound settings for high speeds and low speeds. The wider tuning range allowed engineers to dramatically increase the damper stiffness on the Camaro Z/28 without a significant change in ride quality. There’s also significant weight savings seen with the use of DSSV over GM’s proven Magnetic Ride Control (MRC) setup.

All the engineering bits aside, the 2014 Camaro Z/28 gains an undeniable cool-factor by using DSSV: that’s because it is the second-ever production car to feature such a setup. The first? The ultra-rare, ultra-exclusive, ultra-expensive Aston Martin One-77 hypercar, which carries an MSRP of $1,700,000.

The aggressive suspension system apparently yields impressive results on the track. For instance, Chevrolet claims that the Z/28 is an average of three seconds faster than the more powerful, magnetic-ride-control-equipped Camaro ZL1 around GM’s Milford Road Course. Three seconds!

If GM manages to keep this car “affordable” (like 45-55 grand) my head would explode. But the more i hear about the specs, the more I get the nagging feeling that this is actually going to be a repeat of the original Mustang Cobra R – Race teams and well heeled collectors only, please…

Trust me, at that price I’d be in, too, but there’s not a chance on this Earth that the pricing will be that low. It has carbon ceramics, hand-built LS7, specific body kit, suspension componentry, and unique wheels. These cost savings from weight loss are easily overtaken by those upgrades. GT3 or GT3RS would be closest comparisions and they’ll be over double what this car comes in at, so it’ll still be a bargain.

I’ve read commentary (suuposedly from GM people at the NY auto show) that this car will actually be priced above the ZL1? While I don’t agree with that it likely won’t matter? I expect the production to be fairly limited? Demand,especially initially, will be strong, so expect a high price tag.
I will applaud Reuss and others for bringing this car to market. It’s not for everyone, actually really not for many at all, but it’s just right! It’s a single purpose high performance machine, a very rare thing in the “geez,let’s make everyone happy” world of today.

Also this type of car (as well as the 1LE and ZL1, and Z06) do wonders for “street rep” among performance enthusiast. I guarantee there will me many “non traditional” Chevy customers coming in the show room because of cars like this Z/28.

I don’t expect much about this car to be cheap, save the radio, of course. Out of curiosity, and for a point of reference, I looked up the brake rotors for a ZR1. I was shocked. The GM List Price on those economy rotors is $2408.72……..EACH!

I’m not surprised one bit on the brakes. Porsche’s PCCB’s are in that neighborhood($8500), and that’s “deal” from the factory. As hard as the road racing is on brakes these are the cat’s meow. Meow, let’s get down to business…this is track car, so they did right by putting them on the Z. They should be there, but it’s going to really drive price.

Quoting Porsche for factory upgrade costs when discussing a chevy is a bit much don’t you think. The whole world has known for decades that Porsche “upgrades” are a complete rip off. That being said carbon fiber brakes are expensive. But bear in mind Chevy took a lot out of the car as well. Any way you slice it this going to be a very profitable car for GM.